In a lean first quarter for syndicated bank loans in the Asia-Pacific region, volume (ex-Japan) dropped to US$80.5 billion from 176 deals, down by 17 per cent from the $96.9 billion raised through 359 deals the same period last year. With mainland China all but closed for outbound M&A business as authorities sought to curb capital outflows, Hong Kong stepped up, running the largest "event driven loan financing" for the year to date: a HK13.8 billion buyout loan for the commercial properties of Link Real Estate Investment Trust in Hong Kong.When it came to assessing change in market share, on Thomson Reuters numbers, the pick of the local countries was Malaysia with volumes approaching US$9 billion, a step up from the $1.7 billion recorded for the same period in 2017.Australia showed a six per cent year-on-year increase in loan volume to US$10.7 billion, although more or less at the same volume as was seen in the opening quarters for the last five calendar years.Bank of China maintained its top spot in the first quarter of the APAC 2018 league tables for mandated arranger (ex Japan) followed by China CITIC Bank, DBS and ANZ - the only Australian major bank in the top 15 regionally.Looking at the Thomson Reuters syndicated loan league tables for Australia, then, it's unsurprising to find ANZ at the top mandated arranger and the book runner league tables with almost a 20 per cent and 39 per cent market share in the two respective lists.